I'm home!

Home sweet home!

Yes, I'm finally home - after spending a night in Chennai and spending hours on two planes, I finally got home!

Soda Sikanji

So, it was my last night in Vizag and, of course, I learned something new.

Have you heard of sikanji?

It's a salted drink with some unidentified powder in it - how was it?

Now, I'll give you some details on it.

There is a new place called Spice India and it's apparently owned by one of the Sweet India brothers.

The layout was pretty modern like Marry Brown, but the food resembled that of Chaatpat.

Brooke and I were curious about this new fusion place so we went in - and I, as usual, decided to something new.

I skimmed over the menu and couldn't help but yell out "what's sikanji?"

An Indian guy dressed in western clothes - with a black shirt and a pair of funky jeans - replied and told me that it's a carbonated Indian drink.

"What does it taste like?"

He paused for a minute or so and said, "It's like salted lemonade."

Hmm. Salted lemonade.

Then I came up with another question;

"Which one do you recommend?"

"I personally recommend masala thumbs up."

"Wait... Thumbs up like thumbs up with masala like masala? (sorry for such a horrible sentence.)"

He understood what I meant - I meant "Wait, you seriously mix thumbs up (Indian coke; it's actually produced by the Coca Cola company... how ironic.) with powder masala (typical Indian spice - it's pretty much used in everything. I remember having "Magic Masala" Lays chips.)"

I couldn't decide between Masala Thumbs-Up and Soda Sikanji.

I knew what masala tasted like and I also knew what thumbs up tasted like.

Therefore, I decided to try sikanji (there were three kinds: soda, rose, and khus. Apparently khus sikanji tastes like khus khuse, my favorite Moroccan dish.)

They took the order and took my receipt outside to the "bar."

The "bartender" looked at my receipt and said: soda sikanji?

I replied, and he started squeezing lime into a plastic cup and threw in some ice.

He then sprinkled greyish-greenish powder (A LOT of it) and opened up a bottle of soda.

He tried to make everything look cool by making the soda bubble all over the place...

Yeah, the making of soda sikanji was pretty interesting - and guess what; haha my taste buds said that the taste was pretty interesting as well.

Carbonation of the soda tickled my tongue and the salty powder, mixed with a tint of sweetness in the soda, created an undescribable, unappetizing taste.

There we go - doing something for the first time is never easy.

The aftertaste of having sour lime marinated in salt was even more unpleasant - my taste buds were screaming.

Eh... but why don't I go for a second sip?

It might make a difference.

I started getting used to the odd concoction of different ingredients, but honestly, I just refused to handle it after having five sips.

I mean, I could have finished the whole cup, but I don't think it was worth it.

The fact that I tried something new counted!

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I actually forgot to mention a very important event - I had to say bye to my Telugu friends.

Brooke and I became very emotional but we had to hold the tears in...

The kids were more than aware of the concept of "leaving" - and I think they also knew that there is a very slight chance of us coming back.

We were off to Cafe Coffee Day, and we had a good crying session.

It was really funny, in a way, because Coffee Day is a place where we go to be happy.

A place where we go to have a conversation for a good hour. A happy conversation.

We were overwhelmed by the lack of time. By the bittersweetness of leaving. By the distance that will part us from seeing everyone.

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This is the last blogpost that I'm writing in India, and it's making me think A LOT.

I'm going over everything that happened in the past eventful four months.

Honestly, I can't even think of a way to describe how I feel: of course I'm excited to see my family and friends at home, but leaving India?

I won't see any more of the bright yellow autos that stare at us all the time.

I can't bargain anymore and use my Hindi and Telugu phrases.

And... no more English classes with my friends! :(

What about all those Indians that take pictures of us all the time?

I'm not going to feel like a celebrity anymore...

 

One week.

One week.

Seven days.

That's it. 

In India.

Indian Clothes

Whenever I pictured an Indian woman, I always pictured them in beautiful sarees, with elaborate embroideries.

I didn't know that they were all tailored separately; as a shopper used to getting ready-made clothes, buying fabrics to get them tailored never even crossed my mind.

In India, most women buy fabrics at fabric stores and bring them to tailors - apparently this is much cheaper than buying ready-mades.

For some reason, I expected getting clothes tailored would be more expensive, despite inexpensive labor.

So yesterday, I went to a fabric store called Amber with Brooke, Priya (Brooke's host sister), and Brooke's host mom.

We got materials for scarves because we didn't know what we wanted to get tailored - maybe a salwar kameez or even a saree!

We then went to handicraft stores and different malls to check out more fabrics.

Although I've been in India for more than 3 months now, it seems as if India has something new to offer everyday.

I can't think of any days that I haven't encountered something unfamiliar - actually, I should emphasize the fact that those unfamiliar encounters are more than familiar now!

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A little update on current situation-

As I've mentioned in previous posts, our train trip to Hyderabad was cancelled (if it wasn't, I would be there at the moment) and I was disappointed.

However, at the moment, it is one of the highest alerted cities in India - I'm glad that the trip was cancelled!

We are not allowed to go to Cafe Coffee Day, which is the hot gathering spot for foreigners; but the Park Hotel was opened up for us the other day.

We have two weeks left, and I'm looking forward to making the best out of it.

I can't believe that it's only two weeks now, because I feel like I just came back from our Rajasthan trip (it was in October).

Christmas is also coming up....!

seoyeun

Navy Day - "the" day for Visakhapatnamese! (actually, they're called Vizagites)

I actually made up the word Visakhapatnamese.... pardon me... haha

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There is a navy base in Visakhapatnam and it was Navy Day today.

I went to my host family's friend's house which is located ON the Beach Road - it has a spectacular view.

The event started at 4PM but the Beach road was blocked from 3:30.

It lasted for about 3 hours, with helicopters and planes flying everywhere and "crackers" going off every other second.

Here are some pictures - 

December!

I can't believe that it's already December!

How does this work?!?

I have less than 3 weeks in India.....!

Mumbai Bombings

The day before yesterday at 6:20AM, my phone rang.

It wasn't my alarm - it was my mom.

She didn't wake me up, for I was coming back from my yoga class, but I was confused.

She usually calls me around 4 or 5PM (Indian time).

I picked up the phone;

"Hey, good morning. How are you?"

"Hey mom! ummm I'm fine. Actually I'm great!"

"K.. that's good. Have a good day today. I love you and miss you."

"Love you too. I gotta go get ready. I'll talk to you later."

Not knowing why my mom called - she didn't tell me about "it" because she didn't want me to worry.

I wasn't expecting anything when I came to school.

"HEY GUYS! Did you hear about the bombings in Mumbai?"

Wait. No. I did NOT know about that. Well, obviously my mom did.

By then there were already 80 dead and 250 injured people. (at the moment I think it's 125 dead and 350 injured.)

Apparently the bombings were to attack westerners in general (or to be more specific, Americans and English).

It was terrifying for a friend of mine (he's Mexican), because his parents were staying at the Taj, a five star hotel that was one of the main targets.

However, they were out for lunch/dinner when the bombs went off.

There were other parents who were planning on visiting Mumbai this weekend - how scary is this?!?!

Well when I checked my email, there were emails from people asking me if I was safe.. and "sound."

I'm not sure if I explained a little about the geography of India, but Visakhapatnam is in Andhra Pradesh, and it's quite far away from Mumbai.

Vizag is a relatively small city - and as our resident director put it, "We're probably one of the big things that happened here in a long time (we meaning SYA.)"

But no one knows, so he told us to stay away from five star hotels like the Park and the Taj (not the same Taj, it's official name now is the Gateway Hotel) and recommended us to stay home. If we were to go out, we should be with at lease one member of our host families.

So we are not to be seen. (Maybe that's a little too extreme, but it's for our safety.- actually I joked about this with a friend of mine who looks North Indian; since I'm Korean and she looks Indian we can just go where ever we want! haha.)

Therefore, our trips to Araku Valley and Hyderabad have been cancelled.

Araku Valley... well I've been there twice and I would love to go back but it's fine...

But Hyderabad!!!!! It was one of the places that I was so excited to visit!!!!

Readers, (if there are any at the moment) please don't worry about us, for we're in a safe city.

Our resident director is very experienced (he was in Jerusalem for a while and bombs went off half a mile away from his school twice.)

And we're safe and alive - as you can see me writing a blog post.

Namaste!

Indian Post Office

So finally on my third shot, I was able to send packages to Korea.

I think I spent about 7 hours at the post office altogether, to send TWO packages to Korea.

I've been trying to justify everything by saying "oh different cultures," but apparently even Indians complain about the postal system.

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In Indian History and Culture class, Nazma, our teacher, asked us to make comments about "positive things and negative things" about India.

When it was time for "negative things" I mentioned my experience at the post office.

I was backed off twice because of the wrong packaging - it was because none of the workers at the post office explained what exactly I had to do with the packages.

I had to find a tailor to stitch up the packages with white cloth - I mean, it's just how it's supposed to be, but I thought it was quite odd.

Also, since Visakhapatnam is in a Telugu speaking state Andhra Pradesh, none of them really spoke Hindi (not that I can talk to them in Hindi about my packages) and English.

According to Nazma, the post offices are corrupt - in a sense that the workers ask for more money to process everything - because the government doesn't pay enough for what they do.

It takes forever for Indians to get things done - I thought that it took me longer because I was a foreigner but that was my mistake. I apologize for the misunderstanding.

Well after all the hastle, I did send the packages and I have the "customer's receipts" with me so I'm happy.

(I wonder who's getting those packages.. haha)

Pictrues from Araku Valley!

On Children's Day, Brooke, Callie and I went to Araku Valley with Brooke's host mother - she had to go to a Christian Conference, so we tagged along in her jeep.

The driver was really nice and he took us to a famous museum, garden, and a waterfall.

How did I spend the last two weeks?

Nov. 11 - a "confrontation" with an auto driver

Nov. 12 - St. Joseph's

Nov. 13 - English class with my buddies

Nov. 14 - Children's day/Araku Valley for a day with Brooke and Callie

Nov. 15 - pizza at Mr. Rutherford's!

Nov. 16 - International Day

And this past week was filled with usual routine - homework, yoga classes, cooking classes, reading, etc.

Actually, on Friday the 21st - I can't believe that I forgot to mention this - Brooke's host family and I attempted to make sushi!!!! (although it wasn't exactly successful, I had a great time :).

I also went to the slum as usual....

Oh, today I went to the brunch at the Park Hotel to talk to Mr. Nelson Chase with other SYA'ers.

 

Details of the events mentioned will follow in the next day or two - I bet you can't wait!

Meet My Telugu Speaking Friends!

Yes, I have definitely mentioned my new best friends to you about a month ago, but you never got to see what they look like!!!

So the usual members of our class are the following: Lokesh, Sai Kanakavali, Sri Lakshmi, Ramesh, Shentos, Amrutha, Arvin, Teza, Mounica, Lavenna, and Womsi. 

Three or so kids visit our class from time to time, but they're not there to learn English... They seem to be amused by our presence! haha

So Krupa, the mother of Lokesh and Amrutha, tried to take a group picture for us and here it is:

This is Lokesh, Amrutha, and Ramesh

Aren't they adorable?!?!

That's Mounica in the back with her funny face :)

Amrutha: India's Next Top Model!

Womsi is the baby of our class.

Sri Lakshmi looks good in orange =)

This is Lokesh's book - he wrote my real name down and next to it, he wrote so young to remember how to pronounce it! Ahh these kids are so adorable!

Many people ask me about what we teach - Brooke teaches 7th standard (Lokesh, Ramesh, Mounica, and Shentos) and I teach the 3rd standard (Lavenna, Sri Lakshmi, Sai Kanakavali, Amrutha, Teza, and Arvin)

Brooke's kids get homework from school but my kids don't have "official homework."

Based on my experience as an international student, I've decided that the best way for these kids to learn English is to use hands-on activities, like games and skits.

I used to go to small English classes in Korea in which English was taught by cooking and playing games like Monopoly and twister.

This is certainly a different experience for me, for these telugu speaking kids and I have no language in common.

I've taught Korean kids English over the summer, but we had a language in common. It was much easier to get points across, or in other words, simply to teach.

Starting next week, I'll also be teaching at St. Joseph's, a Catholic all-girls' school near the slum that we go to.

Since St. Joseph's is a Telugu medium school, we will face the language barrier but I'm sure that we'll utilize some Telugu words that we've learned.

Stay tuned for more~

Namaste,

SeoYeun

Romeo, Romeo, Romeo

Oct. 25 - an outing with two of my friends :)

So the beginning seemed to be alright; we had cold drinks at Cafe Coffee Day and started walking down the streets to check out cool handicraft stores.

We then proceeded to the movie theater, specifically Rama Devi, because we wanted to watch an Indian movie called Hello, which is based on One Night at the Call Center by Chetan Bhagat.

"Can we have the tickets for Hello?"

The guy at the ticket booth seemed a little confused but we were sure that we got our point across.

"Hello? Indian movie Hello?"

"Yes. Hello."

"Movie at 2:30. Buy tickets now."

So we bought the so-called "good-seat tickets" that were 40 rupees each, and started walking around again to see what this bustling city has to offer us.

When we came back to watch the movie, we were more than surprised by how the theater was full of men; we could barely spot women.

We totally caught everyone's attention; one, we were foreigners, two, we were girls. haha.

Some Indian adolescents made some inappropriate comments that made us uncomfortable, but we decided to laugh it off... Frankly speaking, I think we're all getting used to it because it happens pretty much everywhere we go.

We walked upstairs screening the posters hanging up on the wall.

It was weird; I didn't see any Hello posters.

All I saw were some weird posters with animated characters on them.

 

Roadside Romeo, read the poster.

 

We tried to convince ourselves that the guy at the ticket booth didn't lie to us, but guess what. The truth hurts.

Some guys came up to us and told us that language won't be a problem, for Roadside Romeo is a Disney movie.

Fine, why don't we give it a shot.

We weren't excited but decided that watching an Indian Disney movie could be a remarkable experience. (actually remarkable is probably not a good word for this. )

After watching the movie for good fifteen minutes, we decided that we showed more than enough patience for the movie. So we left.

Then we had lunch/dinner that lasted for 3 hours.

You know, girls like to talk. Actually, they love to talk. haha

The following pictures were taken on the 25th, for we found these to be hilarious; just look at them!!!

Actually, this first picture needs a little explanation, because I don't think it's funny unless you know the inside joke.

I won't get into it that much, but the guy in the picture is Hrithik Roshan, a famous Bollywood actor.

In Indian History class, we watched this movie called Jodhaa Akbar, a love story about the great Mughal king Akbar and his Hindu wife Jodhaa.

Aishwarya, a former Miss Universe, played Jodhaa.

Frankly speaking, Jodhaa Akbar is not as spectacular as Hollywood movies, but certainly praiseworthy.

I loved the story line and especially the vibrant costumes and sets.

My love for the movie didn't end there - I got my own copy!

I would be more than willing to share my Bollywood movie experience. Just let me know if you would like to watch it :)

Think this is scandalous for an Indian standard? Then you HAVE to watch Indian MTV. Definitely a culture shock.

I'm sorry if this picture is inappropriate... but my friends and I found it very funny. Look at his facial expression!! haha

Pictures from Araku Valley

I taught the ladies how to make friendship bracelets!! (there is a possibility of setting up some kind of organized business-like program with these bracelets :)

:) Chloe

Isn't it beautiful? The air was so refreshing!

We hiked for 3 hours - yes, it is a little far in.

Look how cute the map is!

Waldorf emphasizes hands-on activities.

Our dinner on leaf plates - I actually have one at home :)

We learned how to stitch leaves with twigs!!!!

These hats / crowns were priceless